No, it doesn´t mean cow horn

From Mon 15 August to Fri 2 September, I lived and studied Spanish in gorgeous Cuernavaca, "City of Eternal Spring," located about 85 km south of Mexico City.  

During my almost two-week stay, I had multiple inspiring encounters with nature. Because the city is built among barrancas or gullies, I often walked down a street that was completely developed on my left hand side, but on my right the land dropped off sharply, leaving me looking down into untouched forest. It was quite spectacular.  We are also in the midst of the rainy season here in Mexico, so many nights as I prepared for bed, a terrific thunderstorm raged outside. I had the fortune of staying in a room with a small covered balcony attached, and on these nights, I would drag my desk chair outside, wrap a blanket around my shoulders, listen to the rain and watch the lightning illuminate the gully behind my house.

Spanish classes were certainly a highlight (and the main purpose) of my stay in Cuernavaca. I studied at Universal for 3 or 4 hours every morning with a private tutor. Not only was this a great review of grammatical concepts that I´m not as comfortable with, my two teachers were quite impressive thinkers and had me talking about important issues such as globalization, consumerism and societal structures. Also, after my formal classes and my informal interactions with Mexicans over these two weeks, I´m beginning to get a sense of some Mexican slang. I´m working on incorporating phrases such as mandé, órale, haz de cuenta, güey, híjole and qué chido into my repertoire.

For the first time since my arrival in Mexico, I was forced to function almost exclusively in Spanish. While I was really looking forward to this, it was a big challenge. First, it made me realize how far I still have to go in my mastery of this language... definitely a bruise to my ego :) Secondly, thinking in Spanish all of the time was exhausting! On Saturday I went out with my host sister and four of her friends. As we drove back at about 1:30 am, all 6 of us jammed into a 1970s VW Beetle, Largo suddenly turned to me and said, "Kelly, all of the sudden you´re like a mute person."  I had hardly said a word the entire car ride and my response was an exasperated, "I´m too tired to think in Spanish any more." One plus side of this exhaustion is that I slept extremely well during my stay in Cuernavaca. Every night I fell asleep almost immediately as my head hit my lumpy pillow.

I had another big revelation during my time in Cuernavaca: I´ve never traveled alone before. Ok, this sounds pretty obvious, but it was something I didn´t really think about before leaving. I´ve always gone to new places with family, friends or some sort of structured program. Being solo is a completely different experience. The first few days were a real struggle. After I finished classes, it was up to me to figure out how to spend the next 12 hours of my day. I was staying with a wonderful host family which helped, but they were also quite busy with their own studies, work and social schedules. Also, during my first week there was only one other student at Universal (U.S. news coverage of Mexican affairs has really hurt tourism). So, I spent a lot of time exploring the city as my house was within walking distance of the town center, lounging by Universal´s pool, journaling and listening to music. I had many lonely moments. However, by the first weekend I was getting to know my family and neighbors more, 13 students came to Universal and I re-connected with the host family I stayed with five years ago in Cuernavaca. My time quickly filled up with socializing and sight-seeing and I left feeling quite positive about my experience.

And to conclude, a fun fact about Cuernavaca: contrary to popular belief, the name Cuernavaca does not mean cow horn (in Spanish, cuerna = horn and vaca = cow). The name is actually a hispanicized version of the Nahuatl name Cuauhnahuac, which the Spaniards could not pronounce when they arrived in Mexico.